Roku is out with a new addition to its line of streaming media players. The box itself has a familiar look, but users will immediately notice the user interface is completely redone.
Mashable got a sneak peek from Roku and we can tell you the new UI is a much simpler, easier way to discover content.
Roku has restructured the UI into a grid form, with user index on the left, and channels on the right as you can see in the photo. This way you no longer have to go through the horizontal carousel, looking at one channel at a time.
Now, you'll see nine boxes at a time on your screen and a simple scroll with your remote lets you breeze through them and add what you like to your channel line-up. The channel categories, like sports, music and news, appear in rows on the left. A nice new feature for the forgetful among us is a check mark will appear on the boxes of what you currently have, so you don't spend time trying to add it again.
In our opinion, the grid design is clean, easy to read and makes scrolling through the 750 or so channels Roku currently has, much easier.
Once you've picked your channels you can choose the "My Channels" tab to scroll through your available options. This grid is customizable so you can move your favorite channels to the top of the grid.
Roku has made the search for content easier as well — building on the search upgrade they introduced late last year.
You can search all of the providers for a movie, TV show or even a particular actor. This means that instead of searching Netflix, Hulu and Amazon, you're searching all channels in one place. An icon next to the search results tell you what it is, person, TV or movie. Previews of the show or info on the person appear to the right of the boxes on the search screen.
If you search, for instance, for Game of Thrones, Roku will show you which channels its available on, and let you know if you subscribe to that channel. If you don't have Vudu but want it, you can click and add it right from the search results, without having to go out to a different screen.
Search is broken up into categories shown on the left. They offer "Top Paid" and "most popular" as options. One thing we would like to see is a category for Top Free so people can be directed to channels they subscribe to which offer free content.
The new Roku 3 ($99) has a faster ARM Cortex-A9, dual-core chip. Roku's Lloyd Klarke says that's about five times faster in response time. The Wi-Fi has also been stepped up to dual band to offer faster transfer speeds.
The box itself and the remote have received refinements, both are now more rounded and feel more streamlined. While the remote's physical shape hasn't changed, Roku added a headphone jack which is great if your wants to go to sleep while you're still watching TV. You plug the included headphone into the remote and enter a private listening mode. Volume controls are on the opposite side of the remote so you can adjust the level. Once you unplug the headphones, the volume returns to the TV at the same level it was.
The player has an ethernet, HDMI, USB and MicroSD ports. USB and MicroSD can be used to stream local video and music files from the device.
If you already own a Roku player, you don't need to upgrade to the 3 to get the new UI. That will roll out to current generation Roku players in April.
What do you think of the new features, will you upgrade to the new UI? Let us know in the comments.
Images courtesy of Roku
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario